Fixed-income interview help... does anybody have any suggestions/experience?

I am going in for a final round interview at a bank that focuses primarily on fixed-income. The recruiter told me to prepare for 100% technical questions regarding DCM and FI, however, it feels as though there is so much to cover. Does anyone have any suggestions, experience, or knowledge of specific questions that will be asked? I would love to go in and nail all their questions, so any advice is much appreciated.

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I am going in for a final round interview at a bank that focuses primarily on fixed-income. The recruiter told me to prepare for 100% technical questions regarding DCM and FI, however, it feels as though there is so much to cover. Does anyone have any suggestions, experience, or knowledge of specific questions that will be asked? I would love to go in and nail all their questions, so any advice is much appreciated.

I'll give you a set of questions I got as well as what I heard other candidates in my final round got:

What is duration? How is it calculated?

Term structures? Yield curves, their shapes andhow do you make money on the various ones?

does anyone know of any websites/books that can help with these questions that monkeybusiness threw out? I'm on a buyside trading desk and feel that my knowledge of the markets is definitely not up to par. For my particular job, it really does not have to be ( a monkey can do it) but obviously I plan on moving up, doing something different, possibly moving to sell side at some point, so I need to learn as much as I can. any suggestions?

I also want to break into DCM. Apart from applying and applying, I am also learning somthing every day still. Can you please give a tip on which spreasheets and to which moments in financial statement analysis I shoul pay more attention to be able to handle DCM role, origination or structuring in particular?

Does anyone have any suggestions about treasury associate interview?Specific responsibilities will include: providing supportfor existing businesses and trading strategies; facilitating theimplementation of new strategies; coordinating accounting, operations,compliance, tax, and infrastructure issues; data analysis; anddevelopment of systems specificationsany help would be appreciate. thank you

So I have a final round coming up for a Fixed income analyst position at an investment management firm (think vanguard, fidelity like) and I was hoping for some interview question help.

My background: Semi-target state school grad, 3.6 GPA, Economics and Political Science.Internship: Did research for a boutique, primarily qualitative research for equities.

so how would you guys answer, why fixed income?I can say that fixed income products are more quantitative based so are less volatile. what else can i add.

I will be interviewing for emerging markets divisionanother question is why emerging markets fixed income?I believe that the emerging markets have very positive outlook in the future due to their rapid economic growth. This provides a good investing opportunity.

Any other things helpful things that I might need to know?

any and all ideas are appreciated fellas I am just trying to be as prepared as possible.

Hey guys, I have a first round interview next week for a fixed income (trading) internship, I'm not super familiar with fixed income trading as a whole, I have been doing some reading around here, and some Google searches, however nothing really as in-depth as I am looking for. Do any of you guys have any recommended reading?

So I worked in equity over the summer and didn't like it that much. I am getting more interested in FICC and trying to break in.

I would love all of your advices about how to break into Fixed Income, how to prepare for interviews. Esp for entry levels, do they ask extremely tough quant modelling questions? Since also there are many diff products in FICC, are we supposed to just know the basics of everything or know one or two really well? Is there such thing as Ficc pitch as in equity interviews? In short, what are the anyways you guys go about preparing for these types of interviews?

I'm wondering if you can give me some tips on how to prepare for fixed income technical interviews? I'm from a liberal arts background, so I'm not sure if the way i prepared for it is comprehensive enough. So far, I've read the tutorials about bond on Investopedia, and i've also been trying to keep up with the markets through Financial Times and Seeking Alpha. Are there any other good resources I can use to prepare myself? I have an interview next week.

Hey Guys,I have a SA interview with a large fixed income fund (not PIMCO) coming up. All of my experience is in equities (accounting interview questions, valuations, etc.) and so I'm not sure what sorts of questions to expect for a fixed income position (other than bond price and yield). Does anyone have experience interviewing with top fixed income funds and have any suggestions on what to go over in preparation?

Hey guys,I know this first response is too search for this, but I've had difficulty finding more than a few bits and pieces. I have a couple final rounds for fixed income in investment management and was wondering if people could point me in the right direction for material/questions/topics to study. Thanks a lot.

A buddy of mine has a final round interview soon for an internship on the fixed income derivative swaps desk at a BB. What do you guys think he should prepare for...swaps market in general, current market conditions in the derivative/swaps markets, etc?

This is an interview for fixed income portfolio construction and management. I plan to brush up on all market related events and forecasts related to fixed income. Will macro related events be sufficient? I also plan to brush up on my programming/tech knowledge. I will also be making sure that I formulate my story correctly.

is there anything I should really be aware of?

I've never had an interview at a FIAM shop. It has about $15B AUM and asset allocation consists of corporates, RMBS, Alternatives, CLO, CML, CMBS, etc. What are some good questions to ask? Any advice on how to do well? I come from a slightly different background and this is a break that I've been hoping for so any advice would be greatly appreciated.

I'd like to speak to anyone working in Fixed Income on the Buyside. For part of my interview, I'm given a set of data in Excel and am told to do some modeling (very vague). I just wanted to speak to different people in the industry and see what types of data are useful for them when they are analyzing bonds...(yield, duration, etc)...can anyone please PM me? Thanks.

long time lurker here, but could use some expert help here! If anyone in the AM or HF business could give a few tips to what they would like to see in a thorough analysis of both corporate and govt bonds?I have access to broker research but I cant find any thorough analysis on a fundamental level of corp bonds (most of it is top down concerning spreads and CDS recommendations) so if anyone has one please share!

I have already been interviwed by an MD here in TO (Toronto), but hes trying to flip me over into another office (NY, Chicago , London).We already talked about the markets, about my persoanlity and other stuff like that. He determined my personality is more suited to Fixed Income (sell side).He made i clear to me that he was thrilled with my candidacy, and keeps asking me wether i have various work permits and etc..in order to work in another country.

What i was wondering is that lets say he sends me over to another office, will i need to interview with that specific office's MD, or will they just trust this guy in his pick (me)?

Can he just call his collegue in London, and say I got this kid here in MTL whos smart, blablabla, can you pick him up?

Another question...if i do end up interviewing again for this position, what are the fixed-income specific questions they ask you??

thanks

p.s: i met this MD informally (tennis match), so i manged to get through the whole interview process bullshit ...that might help explain this story

what would be a good response for saying why you are interested in fixed income (such as bonds) instead of equities...specifically for a risk management type of position?? ASAP answer would be much appreciated.

Hey guys, I have an opportunity to interview for a HY fixed income research role. I'm sorta interested, and currently doing work that is directly applicable. I need more info to determine if this is something I'd be interested in.

Can anyone out there please tell me a little more about the daily work/routine as an industry-specific FI associate/analyst? I'm currently imaging equity research + fixed income RV. Is this more or less accurate?

Finally, is FI research even safe these days at BBs? I know FICC business is getting crushed - wouldnt that render research useless? I understand that the credit markets are white-hot right now, but the regulatory changes scare me a bit.

I have an interview with a BB fixed income. I'll be meeting w both the strats group (quant guys making models, etc) and the more sell sidey people who run the models and talk to clients. I know that these are very different but what information would you need to know going in? I'll take info on either group.

I know the strats group will be mainly math based (programming skills a plus). Is anyone familiar with this type of math?

What specific questions/knowledge would someone on the other team (sell-side, client based) require? Apparently they just hired someone with a psych degree and "doesn't know what a bond/excel is, etc." That is a real quote, I obviously don't think said person knows nothing but it has got me thinking. It also makes me want to blow this interview out of the water.

What to expect for CS Fixed income interview (Originally Posted: 02/16/2007)

I have an upcoming interview at the CS QSI (Quantitative Summer Institute). I am from a non financial background (working on my PhD). I was wondering if anyone could give pointers as to what kind of questions to expect on the interview?

I am comfortable with probability, brain teasers and my research. I was not planning on looking up ito calculus, SDE, etc. I am also CFA level II candidate so I was expecting more on put call parity, etc?

Also programming will probably be important. If you have finance stuff listed you will be asked about it as well.

Here's a classic bond question:

Suppose you have a zero coupon bond that pays 100 at maturity with price 50 today. Now let's say you have an option that pays 1 when the price of the bond reaches 70. What is the price of the option today? Assume interest rates are stochastic with unknown dynamic.

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